I am 36 years of age and wish to retire at 40 with a stable income doing the things I love that is; travel from country to country with my family doing Motivation speaking, coaching and community development.For the last 3 years I have focused in building a business in IT consultancy and in particular doing scheduled Computer maintenance contracts. Though this business hasn't been so fruitful I have used its proceeds to pay for my university education. I am in my final year. My desired plan was to have my business sponsor me to go into Motivational Speaking through using it get more education in this area and buy books too that will help me get better. I have had one paid invitation as a Motivational speaker at a local school and around 7 sessions of mentoring that were paid for. Other cases have been on volunteer basis. I have at times felt less courageous to approach institutions about motivational speaking for their students/ staff and this may have contributed to my failure to do well in this area that I really love.On community development, I have been a volunteer in most incidents which I really like doing especially in anti-jigger campaigns.

Please help me find my way through this. I would like to be able to finally do step out and bring my wishes into reality.

If I understand your post correctly, you are on the way to doing exactly what you want. Your IT consultancy pays the bills, and gives you a little left over for more education. You said you've had a few paid speaking/mentoring opportunities, and you did some for free. Great start. Are you looking for more paid speaking engagements? Is that the next step in the wish - To be well known, and to have more customers for your coaching and speaking?

The Barbara Sher coaches are planning an idea party on Facebook for Feb. 1 through 7th. They might have some good suggestions for you. I'll post the link on the boards.

I hope you get your wish.

p.s. I think building a name and a reputation for yourself is hard and takes time. You have almost four years till you turn forty. That's a reasonable amount of time to make a reputation for yourself.

Thanks a lot SquarePeg and Elaine Glimme for the wonderful response.SquarePeg.. I'm heading right into the blog. Looking at the landing page gives me a lot of hope. Thanks a lot

Elaine Glimme.. Yes I'm on my way to doing exactly what I want: Motivational speaking, coaching and community development are my wishes. I am looking for more paid speaking engagement as I intend to put more focus there than in IT and hence I expect that my source of income will be from these engagements. Interesting to point out that today I met a gentleman who told me he has been looking for me so as to work with him in the speaking engagements! That was amazing. More speaking engagements I hope..... I really want to build a good name... to become a household name in my country. I'm not so sure how to do that.

Looking forward to getting number of ideas during the idea party on Feb.

Are you still working on this? I had a friend who was part of Toastmasters. I don't know what country you're in, but I think many countries have it. He signed up for a "Speakers Bureau" in our area and they got him gigs as a paid speaker. The Speakers Bureau was not connected to Toastmasters, but they were able to tell him about it. I'd suggest looking for Speakers Bureaus online in your area. If you're willing to travel, you could look for places farther away from where you live. Also, check out your local Toastmasters group and see if they have recommendations for Speakers Bureaus.

Another idea. Look online for the websites of people who are doing what you want to be doing. Maybe you'll find some ideas there.